Sunday, January 22, 2017

We are very proud of the yarns we have been making and we had a wonderful moment this week that I just had to share with you. Starting a new business is tough but its the kind and thoughtful words or actions of the people around us that keeps us going.

We have been working on a few projects with Marie and Fred Lawson of the Crofter's Weaving Mill and their kind words and encouragement have often come at points of time that we really needed it.

Last week I arrived into the office to find the most wonderful package waiting for me. Marie had sent a beautiful shawl that they have made out of Adagio Mills 4ply yarns. They are loaning it us as a display piece. It is simply stunning. I was moved beyond words.

The shawl is woven using using the SIR WALTER SCOTT Tartan design using Adagio Mills natural black and white alpaca yarn. The result is amazing.

Andrew has taken these lovely photos in our garden. We had to hunt around a bit for some nice green grass! Everything is a bit dry and crunchy here at the moment. We had a little rain this last week but like many others are very much hoping for some more soon!

Marie and Fred are very talented and have the license to weave and design tartan in Australia. If you would like to contact them about their weaving services, please contact us and we will pass on their contact details.

Tuesday, June 28, 2016

I can't believe it, through colds, snow, flooded roads, visitors and generally normal life we have created the Adagio Mills Rainbow Beanie pattern and project kit! It even has multiple sizes!
Hmmm its a little later than I'd planned here... So only a quick hi here to share my excitement!

I'm not usually comfortable with photos of me, nevertheless here I am!
Sporting the Rainbow Sampler beanie in small adault size...

Friday, June 17, 2016

Today was a gorgeous foggy day. The kind where the fog is comforting and lifts all the colours whilst cloaking them in cloud. Perfect day for some craft. Fridays are precious in our household. After the madness of trying to fit as much work in the hours available earlier in the week and James at preschool, Fridays are my day with the boys where we have no commitments. Often there are the pile up of shopping, washing and other household chores but some days like today we ignore them all and we aim to have a quiet day doing preschooler things. As much as they are our dedicated day together, fridays can also often be tricky balancing work calls and James settling back into playing at home after all the entertainment of his preschool friends. So as much as I loved the beauty of the foggy day we definitely needed some planned craft today! With all my test knitting and crochet, James has become inquisitive and has wanted to do something with the yarns himself. After reading around various other blogs I have had a weaving project in mind for him for just such a rainy day event! As I suspected he was a little young yet to really get into it and the project was a little too big for him to finish but both boys thoroughly enjoyed the activity! Even Xavie did quite well with his weaving with a little help. After a few rows, and a good half an hour, James put his aside but he'll be back again I'm sure another day.

Intense concentration for weaving

Things have been the typical brand of chaos trying to keep everything running and improving at the mill and expand our network. We have been doing lots of travelling to markets to talk to as many people as possible and spread the word that we exist. The most wonderful thing is everywhere we go people find us to show what they have made or introduce themselves as one of our kickstarter backers. We are putting so much energy into making every single yarn that it is so uplifting to meet everyone and see what they have been inspired to make. Reminds us of why we are doing this on the tough days.

More than a beanie, a favourite toy

We have also been doing some pattern design experiments in the background. My current project started with some scraps of ends of runs of yarns and Xavie needing a beanie. He just love love loves hats. So when James started wearing his beanie, Xavie wanted one as well and started wearing mine! It was so cute, just kept falling over his eyes but he stubbornly insisted on wearing it! Everyone loves the sample tension strip of colours I have as a display piece and comment on how they'd like to have our rainbow. These various brainstorm ideas collided a few weeks ago and became a prototype Adagio Mills Rainbow Sampler beanie. A few friends and I are currently madly test knitting the various sizes and the mill is completing the missing colours we need for it in the hope that we will be able to release it as a project pack very very soon. Xavie is somewhat perplexed that I was knitting another beanie just like his today! He was just the happiest kid ever when I finished his beanie and he got to wear it in the cold last weekend just like the other bigger kids we had visiting for the weekend. He is so attached with it that during the day he always knows where it is and often includes it in his games as you can see it has been carted around with his blocks in his favourite truck today.

I don't have as much time as I would like to share crafts with my boys but crafts with my Mum forms many of my treasured memories as a child and I love to share them with my boys. What crafts are your favourites to share with your children?

Wednesday, February 17, 2016

I can see many a picnic being enjoyed on this blanket on our front lawn!

Looking out into a paddock of alpacas and seeing the range of beautiful colours grazing to their hearts' content is something really special to behold. I have been trying to think of a way to share our love of the natural alpaca colours, they way they coordinate so beautifully together and hence also our vision for Adagio Mills yarns. The best way I have come up with so far is to start working on a project that has always been waiting to be made in the back of my mind for many years.

As a child my mother had a granny square crochet blanket. One of the classic retro ones with the rainbow colours and black edging. I'm not even sure if she made it or one of her relatives (I really should ask!) but it was something that I loved to snuggle in. I have made a few false starts over the years but have now found the inspiration to start one in ernest.

So the two ideas have collided and I've made a start on my granny square blanket. It's really rather perfect timing for this blanket, until we are really up and running, I can only really justify working with the scraps left over from Adagio Mills yarns and that is exactly what this project needs! It will also be a fantastic keepsake record of our first yarns.

My "paddock of alpacas" granny square blanket is already loved in our household. As soon as I pull the project bag out my two boys instantly drop what they are doing and run over to claim a square or two. I think I'm going to find a stack of them at the bottom of the toy boxes once the project has been finished! They rub the squares on their faces and run around with them with all the ends flying in the air. My eldest has already announced that its going on his bed. Well... we will see.

Some of the yarns and squares currently in progress. Yes, some of the greys almost look blue when combined with the other colours!

Wednesday, February 3, 2016

We have had such fun naming Adagio Mills Weathered Wood. Boring engineer me initially named it Black Fawn... (made sense to me!! black fibre and fawn fibre.. black fawn. easy!) However a family member pointed out that the yarn really wasn't black so that would be confusing. So that got us talking... We kept saying maybe its "grey" or "rose grey" or "bay black" or "brown" but each time we put it near a similar shade of the colour in question it wasn't that at all! We put the adjacent photo up on Instagram and Facebook to see if anyone could help us name this yarn appropriately! (yarn in question is at the base of the photo and middle of the top section with black, grey, rosegrey and brown clockwise from left) We had so many wonderful suggestions including tweed and tortoiseshell but eventually settled on weathered wood.

Adagio Mills Weathered Wood on my front door step!

Its also show to the right up against the railway sleepers that are my front doorstep! Just blends into our doorstep perfectly.

We decided to make some 4 ply and 8 ply from this fibre. Mainly to find out what yarns people would like to use so we now have 4, 5 and 8 ply yarns available. So we will see how they go...

We have also added a brown and fawn blend that we have called latte. It is just so soft and yummy!

Monday, January 25, 2016

Congratulations to Catherine of Jarrahdale who was the winner of our giveaway. Thank you to everyone who entered!

Wow what a journey the past few months have been. We are so proud to be launching a 100% Australian manufacturing business that supports Australian farming and employment. Starting up a business takes guts, determination, a lot of stubbornness and the willingness to take a risk. I think if anyone else tells me that we are "brave" I'll have a not so quiet meltdown in the corner! In any case, Adagio Mills is still very much in its infancy however we are very excited that this will be our very first Australia Day. So in celebration we have decided to do a giveaway competition.

If you are looking for ways to support Australian manufacturing, farming and employment, look for businesses like us in your everyday life. Sometimes we are hard to find, but are often found more easily than first anticipated. We ourselves are spotting more and more fantastic Australian initiatives and try to support them wherever possible.Support 100% Australian manufacturing this Australia Day.

I also managed to finish another knitting project today (shock, horror, I know! I surprised even myself with finishing another project so soon!). Its another Milo, pattern by tiKKi here and my project details on ravelry here. I just love this pattern. I really enjoy knitting the cable and it is such a comfy vest for children to wear. When James was 2 years old, his milo vest was the only jumper he would willingly wear!

Saturday, January 2, 2016

Not surprisingly, in the last year I have done a lot of knitting of tension squares but have run out of time and energy for more involved projects! However over the last few months a number of my friends have had babies so I have started a few knitted presents and am very excited to announce that I actually managed to finish one!

I wish I had found this pattern for when my little ones were babies. I loved having knitted clothing for them but always struggled with finding patterns that I liked and that had enough space under their chubby chins. The pattern is Baby Vertebrae by Pekapeka and can be found on Ravelry here. The yarn is odds and ends of two of the yarns that we made for our Kickstarter backers. The colours are natural brown and fawn.

It has been a huge year for us with the mill starting and our boys growing by the day! Xavie is somehow managing to be cheeky even without any words and has a magic smile that just makes the whole world smile with him. James is becoming more independent by the minute and loves touching all the yarns I bring home. He is old enough to be interested in what I'm doing so once I've finished the promised baby knitting projects I think I'll involve him in picking the pattern for a jumper or vest for winter next year.

Thursday, November 26, 2015

You would think that running fibre mill would result in more knitting right? Hmmm perhaps not... Not yet anyway! Loving working with fibre but in these early stages there is more knitting of tension squares than anything else! However I am managing to squeeze in a few rows here and there. In typical form, I don't just have one project on the go, I have three! I'm knitting socks for me with scraps from the mill, a baby vertebrae for my friend's new bub, a milo for a friend's young boy and have plans for a kina for another friend's new bub! I just can't help myself!

I'm really enjoying knitting with yarn that not only did we make it but we know the people who grew the fibre. Aren't the colours just lovely?

Monday, November 2, 2015

Whilst our household loves cheese and yoghurt, sadly at least two of us are cows milk protein intolerant so cheese and yoghurt aren't such a great idea. I've made a few substitutes along the way, most recently with almond milk in my coffee. I had thought that I had "grown" out of my allergy however since not even having cows milk in my coffee this winter I have been more well than I can remember for a very long time, even with two small boys fermenting bugs! The hardest for our family is for our 4 year old. He loved cheese and yoghurt before we discovered his intolerance and just couldn't understand why he couldn't have it anymore. So it was with great joy that I realised that it is possible to make coconut yoghurt! At the time we couldn't buy it from the local supermarket so with much internet research we gave it a go. I was astounded by how complicated the instructions were! I have a few versions a go with many failed attempts. Throughout the failed attempts I just kept thinking, it can't be this hard!!! So I decided to give super simple a go. It worked! My boy absolutely loves it! He is so happy to be eating yoghurt that he doesn't even realise, or doesn't care that, he isn't eating the ones he used to eat.

A word of warning through. There is good reason for some parts of the complicated versions, including bringing the coconut milk up to a high temperature to kill the unwanted bacteria. However it is so simple that we only make a small amount at a time and it is nearly always eaten within 24hrs of it being cool enough in the fridge!

So my simple version is...

1-2 tins of coconut milk (I use the Ayam 270ml tins, just because we like it, we can get it easily and seems to be free of additives)

2-3T maple syrup (this is not for our flavouring, this is for the probiotic bacteria food)

Put all ingredients in to the Easiyo container then follow directions of your Easiyo maker with regards to water level in the thermos. Leave for 7 hours and transfer to the fridge.

Thats it!

It produces a fairly runny yogurt but no one cares in this household! I have added agar agar to thicken but it requires too much heating and fuss for us. If I want a thicker yoghurt I'll often add a tin of coconut cream instead of milk, which seems to be fine for us. Time in the thermos and if we add 1 or 2 capsules of probiotics helps us adjust how sour we want the yoghurt. (longer time = more sour)

We also by accident made a really nice strawberry frozen yoghurt (we call it strawberry icecream here, was actually attempting a smoothie at the time!). 500g frozen strawberries and some (maybe a cup) of the yoghurt ground up together on speed 9 in the thermomix. Yum!

About Me

Our adventures living on our 9 acres with our boys growing veges, caring for our, alpacas, golden retrievers, steers and chickens. We are also embarking on a new business, Adagio Alpaca Mills. I'm always hopeful that I'll fit some knitting, patchwork and quilting in as well!